African countries plan nanosafety network
A number of African nations have decided to establish a network to build capacity on the safety of nanomaterials. The decision was taken at a workshop in Lusaka, Zambia, organised by the UN Institute for Training and Research (Unitar) and Zambia’s Environmental Management Agency (Zema), with funding from Switzerland. Georg
Small clumps in the body: how nanoparticles react to proteins
Scientists at the INM – Leibniz Institute for New Materials have found out that the protein haemoglobin influences the aggregation of individual gold nanoparticles to form clumps. James Bond can be located anywhere. He owes this fact to the nanosensors that find their way into his bloodstream by way of injection
The EuroScience Open Forum offers a first look at the 2016 Programme
The EuroScience Open Forum has announced its 2016 programme. With keynote speakers including Professor Dame Sally Davies, the UK's Chief Medical Officer, right through to Commissioner Moedas from the European Commission; and sessions on science and technology and their impact on our societies, space exploration and pushing the frontiers of
New NANOSOLUTIONS film – Safer by Design
More and more nano materials are being used in products we use every day, but in order to ensure this proliferation can deliver the innovation society needs, we must ensure that they are safe to use. At the moment, this is both time consuming and expensive. NANOSOLUTIONS is an EU-funded
System Biology in Nanosafety Research – 3rd Mini-Conference on Nanotoxicology – Session 2 Summary
Bengt Fadeel of the Karolinska Institutet spoke about the possibilities of using transcriptomics — gene expression profiling — to aid in the prediction of mechanisms of toxicity. By coupling global “omics” technologies with computational approaches to determine significant perturbations of genes or pathways, one can identify the potential hazards and
Learning from nature
The opening keynote lecture at The Systems Biology in Nanosafety Research conference, taking place at the Karolinska Institute, in Stockholm, brought the perspectives of a material scientist to the forum with a fascinating talk by Professor Olli Ikkala. Professor Ikkala, of the Department of Applied Physics and Centre of Excellence
Spreading the NANOSOLUTIONS word
IPL recently hosted the latest NANOSOLUTIONS dissemination committee meeting, at which committee members discussed the current work of different work packages, the NANOSOLUTIONS safety Classifier and plans by IPL to increase communications activity now that results are beginning to emerge from the project’s experiments. At the core of this communication
WP 12 – Safety Classification
Lang Tran The development and application of ENMs promises many benefits to both society and the global economy. However, to ensure responsible development of this emerging technology, governance must be put into place to ensure that any potential risk posed by ENMs are fully understood and controlled. The regulatory landscape
WP11- Systems biology analysis
Dario Greco One of the main goals of the NANOSOLUTIONS consortium is to create an ENM classifier - a model that can predict the effect of any given nanomaterial. This is being done through what is known as machine learning; we are essentially training a computer programme to know what
WP8 – Disease Models
Fritz Krombach Inhalation of rigid multi-wall carbon nanotubes induces allergic asthma-like symptoms in mice The overall goal of WP8 is to identify the key physicochemical properties and surface modifications of engineered nanomaterials (ENM) that control their fate and biological and toxic effects in cells and tissues from susceptible individuals. For
WP7 – Cross species models
Richard Handy A fundamental part of developing a classification system for nanomaterial safety is to identify the toxic effects that different ENMs have across a wide range of organisms, from microbes to mammals, and on different body systems. These effects are assessed by their overall magnitude of toxicity ¬– low
WP6 – Cell models
Bengt Fadeel and Lucian Farcal WP6 works on the application of in vitro methods for the assessment of nanomaterial (NM) immunotoxicity and genotoxicity. The hypothesis is that refined in vitro assays can replace in vivo testing of NMs. To achieve this goal, WP6 partners selected and refined the SOPs for
WP5 – ENM bio-nanointeraction in biological media
Marco Monopoli The overall objective of WP5 is to clarify the ‘biological identity’ of ENMs before and after they have entered into cells or organisms so that the relationship between the ENM surface (biomolecule corona composition) and mechanisms of toxicity (identified in WP7-10) can be understood. As soon as nanomaterials
WP4 – Life-cycle analysis
Socorro Vázquez-Campos WP4 is devoted to studying the transformation and release of engineered nanomaterials (ENMs) along their life cycle (production, manufacturing, use and disposal) when used in existing applications or industrial processes, and the assessment of the environmental and health impacts of these releases. Researchers have so far performed a
WP3 – Materials
Erik Larsen and Manuel Correia The first half of 2014 consisted of finishing the synthesis of the engineered nanomaterials (ENMs), which has now been completed. Present work, which is ongoing, involves the basic characterisation and development of dispersion protocols for the powder materials. Up until now, more than half of